I focus on using the Internet, Inside Sales, Lead Generation, Gamification, and Social Media to grow business. I'm also an American who cares enough to speak up and a serial entrepreneur with a short attention span, so I need things to work really fast.

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The Death Of SEO: The Rise Of Social, PR, And Real Content

This article has been ranked #1 on all of Forbes and has “rankled” thousands of people. There have been industry experts rise up in defense and offense to what was said here. At last count 525 comments have been made. We stirred a hornets nest. In the end I modified some of my thesis, but stuck stronger than ever to other parts of it. When you are done you may want to read these comments, Death of SEO (Part 2), and this final link also “My Final Comment on my ‘Death of SEO’ article on Forbes” – Ken

I had lunch back in March with Adam Torkildson, one of the top SEO consultants in Utah and one of the best in the country.

He said something to me that blew me away. “GoogleGoogleis in the process of making the SEO industry obsolete, SEO will be dead in 2 years.”

I posted his statement on my blog and immediately received a flurry of comments; many from his colleagues in the SEO industry who wanted to:

Weigh in on my statement that Adam is great (or crazy)

Promote themselves

Accuse me of writing a title for “link bait”

Declare how absurd Adam’s assertion was

Agree and prophecize their vision for the future

I have often used the (recently re-proven) phrase from the bomber pilots in World War II,

“The flak only gets heavy when you’re over the target.”

Adam’s explanation about his claim made a lot of sense. I’ll quickly summarize and add some background information.

“SEO” means Search Engine Optimization.

There is internal and external SEO. Internal makes up about 15% of the process (I’m told it may be much higher now) and it means to design your site so it follows the best practices proven to rank high on Google. External SEO used to mean to write articles, press releases, blogs, comments, and content with embedded keyword “backlinks” to your site. Now it is changing fast to include social media strategies.

SEO has been traditionally divided into “white hat” or “black hat.” Black Hat is the obvious villainous practice of gaming the system by doing things to raise rankings that Google doesn’t want, and White Hat is just more subtle.

But what does Google want? They want relevant, real content on the internet that people want to read and tell other people about. If Google doesn’t bring you the most relevant content when you search they aren’t doing their job.

So by definition even the word Search Engine Optimization (SEO) means to “game” the Google search engines (and others) to get your valuable content ranked higher than it would be if left alone to the forces of the Web.

Google proved Adam right one month later (to the day) with the “Penguin release” that is a code name for the algorithm that decreased search engine rankings of companies who were using schemes to artificially increase their rankings. Google decided to change the weight of their emphasis from just “backlinks” more and more towards social media likes, shares, tweets, reddits, and 1+ (Googles obvious favorite.) In the world of digital media the emphasis is on follows, comments, and views as well.

What does that mean?

Google used to think if you linked to someone on the Internet they must have valuable content. Now Google seems to believe that if you promote content with social media it is more indicative of relevant content and less likely to be faked. Though many point out social can be faked as well.

The bottom line is that all external SEO efforts are counterfeit other than one:

Writing, designing, recording, or videoing real and relevant content that benefits those who search.

If you generate content and place it all over the web promoting and linking to your specific content, it is obviously fake. (And that is basically a big part of the history of the SEO industry, both black and white.)

And hey, I’ve done it myself. That is how I met Adam in the first place.

It is the overly aggressive marketers that always spoil it for everyone. Mmmm, let’s see… false advertisers, telemarketing at dinner time with predictive dialers, unsolicited faxing, email spamming, now SEO.

Cover via Amazon

It was Seth Godin that said “all marketers are liars,” I’m a marketer, so I can say this. I think it means that if you have to advertise a lot to change perceptions, it’s probably being “spun.” Think media, the lack of advertising on fruit and vegetables, and the current presidential race.

Adam told me that it is hardly about the links anymore, it’s about the metrics of engagement on your site.

It’s about social “shares”, and you can’t fake that (easily). Now with recent policy changes, Google knows who everyone is once they open themselves up on the social realm. They will be able to tell the fake people. FacebookFacebook already knows. Adam did a test by creating 1000 fake accounts a year ago, but today they have all been banned.

I asked him how they figured it out, he said “I’m pretty smart, but I have no idea. That’s why they hire PhD’s! That’s why Google bought Twitter’s data. They failed to get Facebook data, but they rely on Facebook’s internal API. Now social signals are a much bigger part of the Google algorithm.” He continued, “I’ve already seen them using it, I know.”

So what do we do?

Adam grinned with resignation, “It’s the Hubspot strategy of great blog content with a massive opt-in audience of social followers. It’s your InsideSales.com approach with strong industry research that people follow. And it’s old-school PR. PR has made a full-on 180 degree swing. I started in PR as a major. Now it is the ultimate, because it is about who you actually, really, know. It’s the buzz you create. And how much value you provide your community of followers in return.”

I summarized:

“So great content is king, and communities of avid followers make the king? And my friend Cheryl, of SnappConner PR will rule the world?”

“Yes, basically.” Adam went on, “DellDell does a really good job. They have 1M followers on just one account in Twitter. Their team answers all direct messages from their community, and stays on top of their brand and reputation.”

I asked, “So how has this affected you?”

“We hardly do any of the old SEO stuff. It still brings results, but not like it used to. Google is pulling the rug out to provide better search for their audience. They are routing out the counterfeiters. Now it must be real, valuable, content, and lots of community value and interaction.”

So how does it affect entrepreneurs and business executives?

Simple.

Invest in real, valuable, relevant content that your audience wants. Grow your internal thought leaders to where they can add value to your audience and positioning in the market. Follow internal SEO practices to make sure it is found and sees the light of day. Take the time to make it so compelling that people talk about it and share it.

Look to real social media community support, compelling PR, and real content; for that is where true SEO practitioners are turning more and more also.

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Kristine, I appreciate you taking a little time to comment. I see you run an internet-based marketing company. I imagine this prediction, if true (and you mention some of this is) it would greatly impact your business. I noticed the self promotion in your comment also.

I am sincerely curious about which parts I have said you view to be true and which parts are not true. I welcome your response.

That was not self-promotion. I added those, so you could see that there was someone commenting with an extensive background in the subject.

Note: If I was promoting I would have added a link to a website of my own, not LinkedIn. Plus I am the only me on the Internet. I do not need to promote. You want to find me. There I am ;)

Also I do not own an Internet based marketing company. I am a consultant of which one of the things I do is Organic Search. I also do code remediation and accessibility, as well as usability, information architecture etc.

So now to address some of your misnomers in the article.

First, content has been a major part of the algo for many years.

For example: I ranked a site in the top 20 with no links in a moderately competitive market in 2008 that was 4 years ago. This is NOT new. Thus, also not the death of SEO as we know it.

How do I know it ranked for content? (Because a Google engineer confirmed it.)

Second, on social signals playing such a dominant role? From Matt Cutts himself at SMX Advanced this June – Yes they play some factor, but not a dominant one. For next ten years or so you want to still be investing in traditional practices especially link building. (paraphrased, but the essence of what he said)

Now on to the idea – social shares and accounts cannot be easily faked? yeah ok and Adam got all his banned so it must be true… as in any signal throughout the history of the industry … the skilled can always fake the algo, the unskilled may or may not be able to, but usually get caught.

Just like faked links before them – fake shares, fake accounts happen every day … you just have to be really good and know how to do it well.

NOTE: I personally do not do it, but know of people that have been highly successful at it.

Now to the crux of your article – “Google is in the process of making the SEO industry obsolete, SEO will be dead in 2 years.”

Not trying to be argumentative and with all due respect, but this just sounds like the statement of someone who was using algo tricks to accomplish algo success. However, I don’t know Adam, so I will not speak to his method, just noting this because nothing my SEO friends or I has been doing stopped working.

In fact my group of sites have been more successful since Panda and Penguin because those updates were not meant to get rid of SEOs. They were meant to get rid of BAD SEOs and bad sites.

Ones who blatantly or badly use SEO tricks to rank. We use a full holistic method that creates a great site for users and you know what when you do that you also wind up addressing so many potential points on the algo your site does BETTER after the updates, not worse.

For example: Using good SEO and SEO strategy – all legit – nothing out of Google’s TOS – we had a page get over 100k unique visits organically in 1 day.

Sound like a dead industry to you?

It isn’t. In fact, the folks from Google come to our conferences. Matt Cutts holds special sessions, answers questions and helps guide SEOs (to the extent he is able) to the best method for staying within the Google TOS.

Now it isn’t to say that Google has not been aggressive against organic placement in some industries, but this is with page space and vertical searches not the updates as you suggest.

Our industry is far from dead, however it has evolved to a great degree. It is like the modern car. Where 20 years ago I could pull out my car and change my brakes and my carburetor, today I would hesitate at an air filter. Why? Cars are much more complex creatures requiring those with a deep understanding of the inner workings of the automobile to make sure the changes are done correctly and without damaging delicate systems such as computer and electrical components.

SEO is no different. If you have little or no experience, if you were not practicing holistic SEO during the updates, if you were scamming the algo in a poor manner, whether “black hat” or “white hate” (note SEOs do not use these terms as they are only tools) you probably got shattered. Those of us who were doing things well in a holistic manner – well our clients did great – some even better than great.

So that is all for now… Unfortunately, your article is filled with misnomers and misunderstandings. I answered what I could as time permitted, but knowingly I only addressed some of the issues.

Just a friendly thought – Before you write the next one, I would suggest you contact a person like Matt Cutts of Google and get a more true picture of the SEO space before you publish the next SEO is dead article.

Kristine, thank you for clarifying and for taking time. I apologize for the misnomers. They looked a little suspicious early on but you make some great points. And the length and effort you have put into your response adds a great deal of credibility to your contribution to the conversation. You are making a worthy defense of your industry. (And thank you for admitting to the value of content.) :)

I thought you would feel it worth the conversation and I’m happy to see you responded.

But after a careful reading of your response… especially with assertions like:

“the skilled can always fake the algo, the unskilled may or may not be able to, but usually get caught.

Just like faked links before them – fake shares, fake accounts happen every day … you just have to be really good and know how to do it well.

NOTE: I personally do not do it, but know of people that have been highly successful at it.”

or

“For example: Using good SEO and SEO strategy – all legit – nothing out of Google’s TOS – we had a page get over 100k unique visits organically in 1 day.”

or

“SEO is no different. If you have little or no experience, if you were not practicing holistic SEO during the updates, if you were scamming the algo in a poor manner, whether “black hat” or “white hate” (note SEOs do not use these terms as they are only tools) you probably got shattered. Those of us who were doing things well in a holistic manner – well our clients did great – some even better than great.”

I think I am still of my original assertion, though I have clarified and tightened up my wording around internal (or onsite, or technical SEO – see my other comments), and I readily admit that Google has not swing completely away from using backlinks in favor of social, though their weighting has changed, and will probably continue to.

And please remember my audience is business owners and entrepreneurs with tight budgets in a tough economy, not SEO gurus (though this conversation is a great addition to the original article).

So here is my summary of thoughts:

1- Internal SEO is more important that ever.

2- External SEO, whether black hat/white hat/holistic, etc. is no substitute for investing within your own company for strong thought leadership that generates real content for real readers who may turn into real customers.

3- SEO (as we know it) will be dead in 2 years.

I will give you this though, current SEO gurus will probably evolve to find other ways around just generating real content for real readers, but I think it does a disservice for your customers, who are my readers.

Thank you Kristin for your response and helping me clarify my thinking even more on the subject. I’m also very glad you agreed that SEOs only use “black hat” and “white hat” as tools. I sincerely wish you and your customers well, though I respectfully disagree on your process even if it is holistic. – Ken

I just wanted to post the YouTube video of Matt Cutts talking about Social Signals vs Links at SMX:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXJylyR2Lc0

He clearly states that links are still a very important factor in ranking.

I think you’re missing the point that “real content for real readers” IS external SEO. That is what generates the highest quality links and the greatest number of links, bar none. Sure this can also be referred to as content marketing. But I think the lines are blurring between these two things and are starting to go hand in hand.

I just don’t see how SEO can die if search engines still exist. SEO is the practice of optimizing your website so that it ranks well in search engines. SEO is not posting comments on other blogs to get spammy back links. That’s one black hat technique of SEO, sure that may die (basically already has).

In the end the practice of SEO will be around as long as there is search engines. It’s really that simple.

Thank you for your respectful reply. I do appreciate the acknowledgments.

I feel however, that I must clarify further because I do not see that you understand what an SEO does yet.

SEOs do not try to get around generating real content. Real content is one of the three cruxes of a great ranking site.

Great Content, Great Links, Great On-Site make a great site.

For instance, what good is it if a site ranks, but no one wants to use it? If the site had lousy content why would people go to it? (traffic) Stay on it? (pageviews) or achieve a site goal? (ROI which is different depending on if you are ecommerce for example or informational)

A good SEO is not about how high can I rank a site using practices to get around Google. A good SEO is about making sure the business owner has an awesome site, with amazing content that users will love, so that when they do get great rankings users will love it, link to it, use it, convert on it and come back to it.

To say ‘SEO gurus will probably evolve to find other ways around just generating real content for real readers’ shows a lack of understanding of what SEO is about and why we would do the work for a client. There has NEVER been a time where I did NOT stress the importance of great content for a site.

HOWEVER, I also stress the importance of proper site pathing, good site architecture, good code, good links (internal and external), great user interface and user experience (for conversions and site stickiness) and the list goes on and on. (How to handle redirects, URL construction, code types, meta data, strategic marketing etc)

To say SEOs do not do all these things would be to be to again not understand the number one crux of the Google TOS. If you make a good site for users, you make a good site for Google.

To that end Google writes its algo to promote sites that it thinks serve this purpose this also means Google does not hate SEOs. GOOD SEO is something Google actually likes. Really? Yes, wouldn’t you if you were them? You have a whole industry out there making the product you serve (sites) better according to your rules (the Google TOS), so that they can achieve site success (rankings).

Do you think if they hated it they would spend so much time at conferences engaging with us, listening to us, guiding us, working with us to create a better experience? That they would have the Google Blog that announces monthly algo changes, Google Webmaster tools to communicate with site owners when they violate the TOS or that they would have the Google SEO Guidelines and tell business owners to when hire SEOs (but also how to spot bad ones http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=35291)

Creating a site that works well in Google is not gaming Google it is what Google wants site owners to do, so they in turn have good product. The fact that you have an industry (SEO) that keeps up with the over 30-75 major changes a month EVERY month this year, all the major updates such as Panda and Penguin (by the way there have been several of these already this year, not just one of each) and can help you understand how your site has been affected if penalized does not make us gamers, it makes us subject matter experts in a complicated industry and I have only scratched the surface of what we do.

Google does not have an issue with SEOs; they are aiming at what they see as bad links, link providers or spammy sites.

So SEO is not dead and won’t be, it is just different, more complex. Content is not new and is not something SEOs have been getting around. While there are some affiliate marketers who use SEO tools that do not use the techniques I proposed above, SEOs like myself have concentrated on doing all this and more – for many years. Why? Because it makes the customer achieve their goals. If we did what you suggest we would have no clients because they would have no success.

Now is there a certain subset of people who call themselves SEOs who do some of what you suggest? Sure, but just like in any industry there are bottom feeders who do bad work to make a fast buck, but I do not consider those SEOs.

As I suggested before you make the next article, you should contact Matt Cutts of Google and get a better idea of how the space works. He is head of the Google Webspam team and can tell you exactly how it works. Or attend an SEO conference where he will be. Or even just spend time reading the Google guidelines for webmasters. You would see your assertions are made by only understanding the elephant’s trunk is a snake – to use the metaphorical.

Again, thank you for being respectful in your comments. I hope you know mine were also made with the same respect.

PS (NOTING I do not use these techniques) Please note the term white hat and black hat as defining terms are as meaningless to an SEO as saying a carpenter uses a handsaw or a buzz saw. They are tools just like black or white hat strategies are tools in an SEO toolkit.

The ONLY philosophical and/or ethical issue arises is if an SEO uses blackhat techniques on a site without telling the site owner of the potential risks or if “negative” SEO techniques are used against a competitor.

Blackhat simply refers to tools an SEO might use that are against Google’s terms of service. To use it as a blanket pejorative is to not understand its meaning or that there are times when it is a perfectly acceptable strategy for marketing purposes.

Finally, the weighting on social has not changed to tremendous degree though you can use G+ to push things to a circle in search, the actual of social has not changed how powerful good links are and will not for many years to come (from Google themselves)

Fantastic how you and Kristin handled this conversation, respectful opinionated responses. My thought is that SEO will never die as long as there are websites. Websites have to be constructed with well meaning logic and with purpose. Google will continue to move the target just to keep everyone honest and establish their own relevance even though they are not the only search engines out there. We just have to keep up with the flow of change. I still have not given up on keyword meta tags. At any rate Social Media Marketing is just another part of SEO.

I have read your entire article, but need to go through these comments still. At first I wanted to write a long comment like Kristy did, however, I just let it slide as it would be a waste of my time. So many points in the article I could go on a rant against…

Feel free to ignore SEO for the coming two years, as in your opinion it will be dead anyway.

At the same time, I will be evolving and reap the benefits from new SEO. Think about it, - SIRI - App store SEO - Video SEO